August 9, 2024

What has been the most memorable promotion and/or contest you have been involved with during your career?

Rich Davis, KDWB: Great story alert! The first time I ever changed the name of one of my stations was in Nashville when we became 1075TheTaylor in honor of Taylor Swift. Unbeknownst to me, she was in town and Frank Bell showed up in my lobby to tell me that Taylor wanted to stop by. We put her in the studio and asked her what song she wanted us to play since after all, it was her station. Her favorite song at the time was “Super Bass” by Nicki Minaj. It was not a single, just an album track at the time and the label didn’t even have a clean version. I bought the song from iTunes, edited it and we started playing it. The video of Taylor rapping went viral, the station got the massive buzz of Taylor not only stopping by but doing the song and credit for being the first station to play Super Bass! Just last year, Billboard named it the 13th best pop song of all time and it all started with Taylor Swift and 1075TheTaylor in Nashville!Brian Mack, iHeartMedia: I always loved the Y100 Underground. We attempted to do secret shows (a riff on KROQ’s Blind Date). Was amazing to watch people’s faces when the door would open!

Dom Theodore, Radio Animal Media Strategies: Back in the day at FLZ in Tampa, we teamed up with Pepsi to give away a trip to the edge of space. Runner-up might be Kwame Kilpatrick scandalous text message of the day contest in Detroit, when the former mayor was caught in a sex scandal when his text messages were made public. We even re-enacted the text messages with his mistress using our voice guy Dr. Dave as Kwame, and our70-year-oldd cleaning lady with a Russian accent as the mistress. Then there was the Britney death pool, and the time we took credit for crop circles that showed up on a farm two counties over, until the TV cameras showed up, and we admitted we punked them. Say what you want, but it worked. This was before we had to ask lawyers for permission.

Toby Knapp, WASH: Topless Summer, Tampa. MJ’s Boob-a-palloza, Pick-your-plastic, Q-Concert, The beach house and weekend-long broadcasts from Clearwater Beach. So many great ones. Not sure how many we could do now. But there was a time.

Jon Zellner, iHeartMedia: Mix 93.3’s Big Black Box. We built a huge 50×50 ft. black box, hung it from a crane over the freeway and just painted a bunch of question marks on it for a couple weeks to create talk. Then, we replaced the question marks with station logos and the promos began “High atop I-35 on the Kansas/Missouri State Line is a big black box. Inside, over $100,000 in cash and prizes. Guess what’s in it and win it.” We gave out clues every hour until someone guessed all the items in the box, including a car, jewelry, groceries, trip, cash, etc.

Jeff Hurley, iHeartMedia: In the early 2000’s we did “Whirl Til You Hurl” at Star 104 in Erie. Started with 8 contestants who lived on the skyride at Waldameer amusement park. They would ride non-stop every day while the park was open. We had immunity challenges and special contests the whole time. After 43 days the winner drove away in a new car. It’s still the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever been a part of. I must have eaten 100 funnel cakes that summer.

Jammer, WEZB: At WABB in Mobile.. We did BREAK THE 97.5 WABB PIGGY BANK.. Everyone who called and promised to listen to 975 WABB we would add another dollar to the bank.. They had to call with the phrase “I LISTEN TO 97.5 WABB OINK OINK (PIG NOISE INCLUDED)” IT WAS INSANE….. WHEN THE PIG GOT TO FAT AND EXPODED WE STARTED TO GIVE AWAY THE MONEY $97 AT A TIME.. It was once again AMAZING!! The audio was gold:))

Kid Jay, iHeartMedia: That’s Easy… “Judge Tito” contest for Power House Tickets during the OJ Simpson Trial. When we showed up to the downtown LA courthouse there were hundreds of listeners dressed up as Judge Ito and hundreds of media outlets there to record it! Brillant!

Jonathan Shuford, WRVW: I had people dress up as a donut and had listeners come and lick us to have a chance to win Ariana Grande tickets during that time when she had that licking the donut incident. It went viral in a big way. We surprised listeners at school and at with primo Taylor Swift tickets back on the 1989 Tour. After a tornado hit Nashville right before Christmas, we did a toy drive where we loaded up two trucks with toys for kids who had lost everything.

Matt Johnson, WPLW: Drop it or Drive it! in Fort Myers. We hung a 2004 Mustang from a crane and the audience voted if the winner should drive or we should drop it! Needless to say, it was an expensive promotion, and the audience voted for us to drop it! We got some great press and had a huge ratings bump.

Erik Bradley, B96: ANY of the Summer and Jingle Bashes, most particularly Summer Bash ’99 with Ricky Martin, *NSYNC, Britney Spears and more. WGN-TV was live on-air from the venue when Ricky (who could not have been any hotter at that time) hit the stage. Pure pandemonium in the best way. Jingle Bash 2017 with Taylor Swift, BSB, Sabrina Carpenter and more as Taylor’s Reputation Era was in full swing. Incredible vibes!

R Dub!, Z90/Magic 92.5: I’m proud to say Z90’s “Epic 48 Hours” has been hailed as the biggest radio OR TV promotion in modern history. Three rules: Be willing to go anywhere, be willing to do anything, and be ready to leave at a moment’s notice. ONE guarantee: THE most Epic 48 hours of your life! Our winners have no idea what will happen as every minute there is a different turn. Some of the best moments have included meeting Lady Gaga backstage at The Superbowl, going shopping for diamonds, jumping out of a plane, landing in Buenos Aires for Tango lessons and staying in a palace in Morocco before seeing Bruno Mars in concert. Everything is absolute first class and so many money-can’t-buy experiences. I IMPLORE you to see some of our video recaps of our Epic 48 Hours here: https://www.z90.com/epic48/

Danny Ocean, WSBG: Right now!!! 93 5 SBG’s Super Summer Getaway to see Taylor Swift/The Eras Tour in Miami. All summer for 15 weeks we are awarding 3 qualifiers each day they win vinyl/CD catalog merch with every winner in the running for round trip airfare for two/hotel for 2 nights plus a pair of premium tickets. Biggest event on the planet! Phones are off the hook advertisers can’t get enough! LOCAL Radio Wins Again!!

Orlando Davis, WLLD: Show Us You’re WiLD. 25k for the listener, who got our logo in front of the most eyes. My favorite was the kid who took the station logo’s tire cover, off of our Jeep and streaked across Monday Night Football. He didn’t win, because you can’t commit a crime, but it was awesome. 😜

Randi West, WRMF: So hard to pick one but I loved Mani, Pedi, Demi for Demi Lovato tickets and pampering before the show and I loved “I’m Rich Bitch” cash contest back in the day of a Dave Chapelle skit that made for AWESOME promos and was just fun to hear listeners yell “I’m Rich Bitch!”

Buster, WIOQ: A Q102 Drone Show to kick off a summer promotion during the pandemic was pretty awesome! And at FLZ a cool helicopter promotion where love was in the air, and on the air during Valentine’s Day.

Drew Heyman, WHYI: In Orlando, when NBA Magic star Dwight Howard left for the Lakers. We put up a billboard with a countdown ticker saying, “Dwight Leaves Us Again in…” And in Miami, we did a similar thing with a countdown ticker until spring breakers leave us.

Bob Patrick, WXLK: At WAYV/Atlantic City we did *NSYNC for *NSYNC during the peak of the boy band era. We had people trying to sing *NSYNC songs for tickets, It was HUGE with kids and parents.